In improv classes across London and beyond, lawyers are learning that play, embarrassment, and spontaneity might be the antidote to rigid adult life.
It’s not every day you walk into a room full of adults rhythmically patting their legs, yelling “bunny, bunny” at each other while others in the group wave their arms singing “tookie, tookie” at the same time.
The space is alive with movement as we stand in a circle, laughing, pointing, and rolling our arms as we play another icebreaker and try to remember the actions of everyone who went before us. We play name games, pairing each name with an action, something that feels more like primary school than adulthood.
In this improv class, we continue to build on everything in the moment, reacting immediately and saying yes to whatever happens next. With no scripts or rehearsed lines, every scene unfolds unpredictably. Letting loose this way feels uncomfortable, but for some, especially lawyers, that discomfort is the point.
For adults, play often looks like creative hobbies, game nights, and physical activities like dancing or hiking, mainly rule-based and structured, compared to playing as children, being free-spirited and expressive regardless of other people’s opinions.
“With adult games, it’s about winning and competition-based,” says Improv instructor Karolina Krits. Here though, “that’s not the aim…Its a complete letting go of any perception of how it has to be and an exploration of what we can create with our imagination together, by just being open to whatever someone tells you.”
There are no rules (other than to be respectful, of course) and no competition. Instead, the focus is “to create together, to tap into each other’s imagination and be able to create something out of the moment.”
For lawyer Alanna Pierce, improv offers that freedom: “I think improv really made me reconnect with the more childlike side of things. Just because we’re adults doesn’t mean everything has to be serious. You can still be silly.”
“Being able to make people laugh is the biggest win of being able just to play and forget our troubles for the moment.”
Alanna Pierce
When Pierce first started as an attorney, she felt like she needed to wear a suit and have a professional persona to be taken seriously in her career.
Doing improv took away from that perceived image, initially making Pierce afraid of looking unprofessional in front of her colleagues. Despite this, she found that “so many people are not only artistic, but love finding out that there’s a silly side to the seriousness.” A co-worker even said, “Alanna was a theatre major, and we love it!”
Pierce previously practised in court but now works for a research company doing legal artificial intelligence. “It’s mostly spreadsheets and very technical stuff in knowing different areas of the law”, she says.
A former theatre major, Pierce moved to Atlanta, Georgia, a year and a half ago and didn’t know how to connect with people in the new city. After being consumed with paperwork, she says, “I wanted to get to know people and get back into the art scene.”
She auditioned for an improv annihilation competition where each week she performs for a crowd that will ultimately vote to decide if she will make it to the next week. She made it 11 out of 13 weeks in the competition before she was eliminated. Given that this was her first time performing on a stage in years, Pierce was surprised she even made it past the auditions.
Krits, who teaches at BOLD Elephant in Elephant and Castle, says, “I would definitely describe [improv] as an invitation to go to a playground, as you would do as a child. To say, ‘Hey, I don’t know you, but let’s play this game that everyone is playing.’ Improv is an invitation to be a child on the playground again.”
Having had a career as a journalist in Austria, she moved to London to pursue acting, and has been performing both short-form and fully improvised plays for over 12 years across the UK and Europe.
Krits began teaching an ‘Improv your confidence’ class for people who wanted to break away from rigidity and form authentic connections with other people. “I’ve taught all different types of people, young people, old people, people with anxiety and depression, police officers,” she told me.
“Improv is an invitation to be a child on the playground again.”
Karolina Krits
Many of her students leave the classes with a more confident sense of themselves: “It definitely helped people to be able to start expressing themselves outside of improv,” she says. “It’s really trusting yourself to go and do something scary; to be more at ease and laugh at yourself when you say something silly.” Some even went on to perform in their own stand-up comedy shows.
“There will be moments when something feels uncomfortable, and you’ll want to hide somewhere, but one thing to remember is that everyone feels this way because it’s new,” Krits explained.
With improv, it’s a chance to exist in the moment without thinking about how other people’s judgments. “You have to make your inner critic be less loud. It takes a bit of time and a little bit of courage and repetition; the more often you do it and show up, the easier it becomes,” she says.
Stepping back into her acting roots, Pierce learned to have a more positive mindset. “For attorneys, we are supposed to find the issues, so you’re used to finding those negative details or trying to predict what could possibly go wrong,” she says. “With improv, it’s about being more creative and looking for the bright side and the silver lining of things”
Since participating in the Improv competition, Pierce has found similarities in her different worlds. “I think being an attorney and being an actor are two sides of the same coin, where you have those people skills and the ability to watch, and wait, and listen if you need to, but react to that moment when you do.”
Improv gives people a chance to break away from serious adult topics and offers a safe space for creativity and play. “Sometimes we can turn off the news and just exist in the moment and make people laugh,” she says. “Being able to make people laugh is the biggest win of being able just to play and forget our troubles for the moment.”
As the room fills with laughter while we perform, we are unlike our usual selves. It’s clear that for a moment, no one is thinking about work, expectations, or getting it right. They’re just playing.
As Krits says, “I think improv is the most human-based play you can have.”
Featured image by Diana Cedillo.